The Ska’vyn Consortium

Frequently Asked Questions

Section I

Background

Q) What is The Ska’vyn Consortium?

A) Simply put, The Ska’vyn Consotium is a network of two Trade Guilds – The Ska’vyn Exchange (“TSE”) and The Ska’vyn Bazaar (“TSB”). Both are high-end Trading Guilds whose goal is to provide members with access to top-tier Guild Trader Kiosk locations while maintaining an incredibly supportive, friendly and helpful environment.

Q) How long has Ska’vyn been around?

A) Great question! You may notice that The Ska’vyn Exchange has a “Founded” date of 03/30/2014 – also known as “Day One” of the Early Access PC/Mac launch period. Our guild’s core has been around for a long time – but we weren’t always a Trade Guild! In fact, TSE started out as the official “Elder Scrolls Online” guild for a now-defunct cross-gaming community. After that community collapsed in mid-2015, a few of our remaining leaders stuck around and, after several months of low activity, we officially converted into a Trade-focused guild in January of 2016! We’ve quickly grown into one of the very best Trade Guilds in Tamriel, so much so that we were able to found a second guild, The Ska’vyn Bazaar, in January 2017. This is all thanks to the hard work, dedication and experience of our Guild Master & Officers, as well as all of our incredibly supportive and active members – we hope you’ll enjoy yourself as a part of our community!

Q) So, what’s the deal with the Guild Name?

A) Our guild is named for the city of Ska’vyn (sometimes spelled “Skaven”), located in Central Hammerfell, our original home. After recent events related to the ongoing Three Banners War, The Exchange and Bazaar have relocated to capitalize on greater business opportunities in other areas of Tamriel – but we continue to proudly display the name of our homeland.

Q) I see TSE and TSB are aligned with the Covenant – what’s up with that?

A) Our allegiance to the Daggerfall Covenant is a loose affiliation at best. While we do occasionally offer our wares for sale in the war-torn region of Cyrodiil under the protection of Emeric’s banner, we as a Guild never officially engage in open combat. You may occasionally see some familiar faces on the battlefield, as we allow our members to do what they please on their own time, but as a Trade Organization, our sole focus is coin – cold, hard gold. As such, we accept members from any of the three major Tamrielic alliances – be you of the Pact, Dominion, or Covenant.

Q) How do I communicate with my Ska’vyn friends when I’m not in Tamriel?

A) Our Guild Leadership Team has created an official Discord server for the free and open use of all of our members! Discord is an incredibly robust, lightweight Voice & Text Chat program available for Windows, Mac, iOS and Android, and it also has a browser-based web client! We regularly get together to chat, make crafting requests, share the dankest of memes, answer questions, organize PvE & PvP groups, and more, all through Discord!

Section II

Membership Policy

Q) Are there any requirements that I need to fulfill to stay a member in Ska’vyn?

A) In short, yes. Our current requirements to remain a member-in-good-standing are listed below:

1. The Ska’vyn Exchange: Average Weekly xCoin Balance: 7,500+

2. The Ska’vyn Bazaar: Average Weekly xCoin Balance: 2,500+

Q) Wait, why do I have to fulfill requirements to stay in the Guild?

A) Continuing to operate as a top-tier Trade Guild is an incredibly expensive and time-consuming task. While we understand that some players are at different stages of their ESO-lifecycle, and not everyone can contribute at the same level week in and week out, we also cannot afford to have our precious few Roster Slots used up by members who aren’t contibuting in a meaningful way to the Guild. As such, we’ve implemented our minimum membership requirements as a guideline to help our members ensure they remain eligible to stay in Ska’vyn as full members for the long haul.

Q) So, I used to be a member of Ska’vyn, but I’m not anymore. Can I come back?

A) Absolutely! Unless you were removed from the guild due to unacceptable behavior, we’re always open to giving former members a second chance. If you missed your minimum requirements one week, or took a break from the game and left, but would like to return, feel free to contact the Guild Master or one of our Guild Officers, and we’ll do our best to get you back into Ska’vyn as soon as possible.

Q) I have a friend who wants to join, but I can’t invite them. What do I do?

A) Contact the Guild Master or one of our Officers. If there is an open space in the Guild, we’ll do our best to ensure they get a spot. If the Guild Roster for both guilds are currently full (Roster Cap is 500 Players), we will add them to our Guild Waiting List, and send them an invite once a space opens up.

Q) Other than the requirements listed above, I don’t see many “rules” for members. Does that mean I can do whatever I want?

A) Yes, and no. We’ve intentionally kept our “list of rules” to a minimum – in short, we don’t have a formal code of conduct. The members of our Leadership Team are no one’s keeper, and we expect our members to conduct their business on their own and resolve their issues and disputes privately. Our only real rule?

Don’t be a jerk.

We’ll be brutally blunt here – The Ska’vyn Exchange and Bazaar are not a democracy. The Leadership Team reserves the right to remove any and all members, with no formal explanation or forewarning, at any time. We seriously don’t care if you’re a massive donor, a popular community personality on Twitch or YouTube, sell 1,000,000g a week, or if your step-sister was Gina Bruno’s college roommate. If you’re an asshole, we will remove you.

We realize that sounds harsh, but really, if you’re a remotely decent person, you honestly don’t have much to worry about. As long as you’re meeting your Minimum Membership Requirements (detailed above), you’re probably fine. Our Leadership Team does everything it can to ensure that we’re maintaining a positive and healthy environment and culture within the Guild. If someone’s presence or behavior causes harm to other members, upsets the balance of our community, or puts our culture at risk, we will take care of it swiftly. We’ve collectively poured tens of thousands of hours into creating and maintaining a culture and family environment everyone can be proud of, and we’re not about to let some good-for-nothing twat ruin it. Think of our GM and Officer Team as a “friendly, but no-nonsense oligarch”.

Be nice, and nobody gets hurt.

Section III

Guild Ranks & xCoin Balances

Q) So, I see all of these different Guild Ranks – how do they work?

A) In Ska’vyn, our Guild Ranks are based on our xCoin Balance metric – a unique system developed to accurately measure the weekly and monthly contributions our members make to the Guild’s bottom line. xCoin Balances are calculated and posted at the end of each fiscal week, usually by midnight on Sunday evenings (Eastern Time). The higher your xCoin Balance is, the higher your Rank!

Q) What happens if I’m demoted to the Peddler rank?

A) Initially? Nothing. Listen, we understand that everyone has an off-week here and there, so if you’re ever placed in the Peddler rank, you’ll always* have one full week to work your way back up out of it to the ranks of Merchant and above.

Only if you fail to work your way out of the Peddler rank for a second consecutive week will your guild membership be placed in jeopardy. The Guild Master generally kicks all individuals who remain in the Peddler rank at the beginning of each new fiscal week – so be sure to grab yourself some raffle tickets and redouble your sales efforts to avoid this!

A) Remember Section II of the FAQ? That whole “Don’t be a jerk” clause?

Yeah, nobody’s exempt from that. So if you decide to rain down some hellfire and brimstone, being placed in the “Peddler” rank isn’t some weird loophole to make you exempt from the rules.

Q) WHOA, WHOA, WHOA! I’m going on vacation for a few weeks, and I won’t be able to be online to make sure I’m selling things or donating. Am I going to get kicked?

A) Not necessarily. We actually have a lot of members who go on vacation between weeks, so we totally understand if you’re going to have a slightly extended hiatus. Just let a Guild Officer or the Guild Master know that you’re leaving, and be sure to list the dates that you’ll be away on your Note next to your name on the Guild Roster, and we’ll consider your case.

That being said – in most situations, it isn’t too difficult to make sure you’re stocking up your Listings before you leave. Oftentimes, items you list will continue to sell while you’re away, and you can maintain your membership status without being online! Just be smart, and communicate with the Leadership Team.

Q) You mentioned this ‘xCoin Balance’ system. That’s cool and all, but how are xCoin Balances actually calculated?

A) Oh, you want some math? We’ll give you some math. Brace yourself, you naive fool, it’s time to get nerdy.

xCoin Balances are calculated as an aggregate running total of your actual contributions to the Guild. Think of one ‘xCoin’ as being roughly equivalent to one ‘Gold’ of in-game currency. So, a Weekly xCoin Balance of 35,000 is roughly equivalent to 35,000g contributed to the Guild’s bottom line during that fiscal week.

There are several elements that are calculated together to create your xCoin Balance:

Salesare calculated at 3.5% of their gross value, since the Guild collects a 3.5% tax rate on all Guild Store sales.

Purchasesof items from the Guild Store are also calculated at 3.5% of their gross value, since the Guild collects a 3.5% tax rate on all Guild Store purchases.

Raffle Ticket Purchasesare calculated at 50% of their gross value, since prize values from raffles cost roughly 50% of the value of all tickets purchased in a given week.

Gold Donationsare calculated at 100% of their gross value.

Item Donationsare calculated at 100% of their gross MM value, at the discretion of the Leadership Team. Please note that the Guild will happily accept donations from its members, but we may not credit you for throwaway items or items worth little or no value. We’re looking for items that we can do something with – Ska’vyn is not your trash dump.

Auction Salesare calculated at 100% of their gross MM value, less any pre-determined or requested Sellers’ Cut. For example, if you sell an item in the TSE Weekly Auction that is worth 50,000g, but you request a 25% cut of the final sale price, you will only be credited for 75% of the item value towards your xCoin Balance, or 37,500g.

Please note that the xCoin Balance calculation is conducted with the Estimated Listing Value, and not the Final Listing Sale Price.

Auction Purchasesare calculated at 100% of the positive spread between the Final Auction Listing Sale Price and the Estimated Listing Value. For example, if you purchase an item at Auction for 20,000g, but our Estimated Value pegs the item at only 18,000g, you will be credited for that 2,000g difference for a boost of 2,000 xCoins.

Please note that if you purchase an item for less than its Estimated Listing Value, you nor the seller are penalized in any way.

Q) Holy wall of text, man! But I thought you were going to show me some math?

Q) Man, I really don’t like math. Do I really have to read all of that?

A) Yes.

Q) Seriously? Can’t you just give me a TL;DR?

A) No. That was the TL;DR. Read it.

Q) Really?

A) Yes.

Q) . . . Really?

A) YES!

Q) Okay, fine. But can you at least tell me what the minimum requirements would equate to for each of the different variables?

A) Sure. Here’s the absolute minimum you would need to do of any of the individual variables, assuming you did nothing other that one element of the metric for the entire week:

—

The Ska’vyn Exchange

Minimum Weekly xCoin Balance: 7,500 xCoins

Sales:214,286gPurchases:214,286gRaffle Tickets:15,000gGold Donations: 7,500gItem Donations:Value of 7,500g+Auction Listing:We probably won’t sell many listings worth only 7,500g, but if you can figure out something creative and cheap, let’s talk.Auction Purchases:7,500g positive spread between the Estimated Listing Value and Final Sale PriceFarmageddon Donations:Basically just show up. Seriously, it’s virtually impossible to farm less than 7,500g worth of materials in an hour.

—

The Ska’vyn Bazaar

Minimum Weekly xCoin Balance: 2,500 xCoins

Sales: 71,428gPurchases:71,428gRaffle Tickets: 5,000gGold Donations: 2,500gItem Donations:Value of 2,500g+Auction Listing:We probably won’t sell many listings worth only 2,500g, but if you can figure out something creative and cheap, let’s talk.Auction Purchases: 2,500g positive spread between the Estimated Listing Value and Final Sale PriceFarmageddon Donations:Basically just show up. Seriously, it’s virtually impossible to farm less than 2,500g worth of materials in an hour.

Q) One last question – how do you differentiate what’s a Raffle Ticket and what’s a Donation?

A) Great question! We see a lot of members make this mistake, so be sure to pay attention to this one. In short, any Guild Bank deposit that ends with three zeros is considered a ticket. A deposit that ends in anything other than that is a donation.

For example, if I want to buy 5 Raffle Tickets, I’d deposit 5,000g into the Guild Bank. But if I wanted to donate that gold, I’d deposit 5,001g into the Bank.

Section IV

Fundraising

Q) So, what’s the point of fundraising?

A) In short, paying for our Trader Kiosk every week is extremely expensive. The Guild only collects a 3.5% tax on sales – so if we have to pay 10,000,000g for a location one week, and only do 75,000,000 in sales, that’s barely 2,500,000g in Tax. That doesn’t even come close to covering the cost of our bids – and with the blind bidding system, holding on to our spot can be extremely competitive and difficult.

That’s where fundraisers come in. Without things like raffles, auctions, and farming events, we simply couldn’t afford to maintain our high-end Guild Trader for very long. By purchasing raffle tickets, paying above the Market Value for an item at Auction, donating, or attending farm events, you’re not only helping ensure the guild can keep running smoothly, but you also get rewarded via Rank Promotions and, sometimes, awesome prizes!

Q) You listed a few ways to earn xCoins earlier, beyond just Sales and Purchases. What are they?

Section V

Raffles

Q) Raffles, huh? What’s up with that?

A) Remember what we said about fundraising back in Section IV? Our raffles aren’t only one of our fundraisers – they’re our biggest one, and without them being successful we simply wouldn’t be able to afford our weekly upkeep costs. They’re also one of the easier ways for our members to contribute to the guild, maintain high xCoin Balances, and win some awesome prizes!

Q) Splendiferous! Swagtastic even! So how do these “Raffluffles” work, mi amigo?

A) LOVE THAT ENTHUSIASM!

But let’s get right down to it and answer that question, since they’re really quite simple:

1) You buy tickets2) We draw prizes.

That’s it!

Q) Okay…well, how much do tickets cost? And how can I buy them?

A) Tickets cost 1,000g each, and you can buy them by depositing gold into the Guild Bank!

Oh, and don’t worry – you can buy in bulk. Want to buy 50 tickets? Just toss in 50,000g once – there’s no need to do 50 separate deposits of 1,000g. We’ll figure it out! 😉

Q) So, how do you know what I deposit in the bank is a ticket?

A) Simple! Anything you deposit that ends in three zeros is a ticket deposit. If it doesn’t end in three zeros, we consider that a donation. So if you’re buying 10 tickets, you’d deposit 10,000g, but if you were donating 10,000g, you’d drop in 10,001g.

Or 10,002g.Or 10,286g.Or 9,999g.Or 10,878g.Or 10,034g.Or –

Q) OKAY, I GET IT. That’s pretty simple. So what kind of prizes are we talking about?

A) Only the best kind! We give away a whole slew of unique prizes every single week. But rather than bore you by trying to explain it long-hand, let’s just show you a real example, shall we?

In every week’s raffle, we give away at least 5 prizes – all subsequent prizes are unlocked when we’ve reached specific ticket-sales thresholds. So in the above example, if we were to have sold 2,500+ tickets that week, we’d give away nine prizes – but if we only sold 1,200 tickets, there would be six prizes.

Make sense?

Q) Well, sure, I’m not stupid. But what’s the deal with the 10,000 Tas?

A) What’ve you got against Tas?

Q) They’re worthless!

A) No they aren’t! They’re delicious!

Q) Wait, you can eat Tas?

A) Technically, you can eat anything if you try hard enough.

Q) …Okay then. Are there any other ways I can get tickets?

Yes, actually! We offer Raffle Tickets as prizes during some of our Fundraising Events, like Farmageddon (which you can read about below).

Q) Awesome! So, one more question – is there any limit to how many tickets I can buy?

A) Nope! Buy as many as you like! Just keep in mind – you can only win one prize per week. So if you have multiple tickets pulled as “winners”, we’ll only let you claim the first prize, and any subsequent tickets will be re-drawn.

Q) Even if I buy 1,000,000 tickets?

A) Yup. We’re happy to have you contributing to the Guild, but it’s important to us to make sure that all of our participants have a fair chance to get something. If one person buys half of the tickets, they could potentially win everything! And that’s not fun for anybody.

Section VI

Donations

Q) So, what if I don’t want to buy raffle tickets? Can I just donate stuff?

A) Sure! We’re always open to meaningful donations from our members. We accept both Gold Donations and Item Donations.

As we outlined in the previous sections above, any amount of Gold deposited into the Guild Bank that doesn’t end in three zeros (ie. 1,001g) is considered a Gold Donation. As for Item Donations, feel free to deposit any valuable commodities into the Guild Bank, and we’ll assign them gold values based on Guild Master Merchant data to credit your xCoin Balance.

The value of any donation, be it of gold or items, counts 100% towards increasing your xCoin Balance.

Q) Alright, cool. I think Gold Donations seem pretty self-explanatory, but how about Items? Is there a limit to what kinds of things the Guild accepts?

A) In short – yes, there are limitations. Generally speaking, the Guild is looking for items that it can make gold from, which could encompass almost anything. However, since the Guild Bank is limited to only 500 individual slots, we have to make sure that we’re using that space efficiently.

As such, we try to only accept valuable commodities and consumables as donations. Things like raw materials, tempers, recipes and blueprints, motif patterns, unfilleted fish, rare trophies and furniture, etc., are all acceptable. We generally do not accept donations of gear, or items that do not “stack”.

Just try to be smart when you deposit something into the Bank as a donation. Ask yourself, “Would I, or a lot of other people, want this thing?”, and if the answer is “no” – then we probably don’t want it either. The Guild Bank is here to help fund our Trader Bids and supply our Raffles and Auctions with prizes – it isn’t your trash dump.

Section VII

Auctions

Q) Auctions, huh? Those seem cool. How do they work?

A) They are cool! It’s really quite simple – every week, Guild Leadership takes a look at all of the items we have available, be it personally, within the Guild Bank, or items that have been sent in by our members – and we create a short list of “Item Lots” to sell. And then we sell them, in Guild Chat, on Saturday nights! There’s usually a few hundred people online, and our members have the opportunity to input their bids live, in chat, in real time, and come away with some really cool listings when all is said and done.

Q) WHOA, HOLD UP. Did you just say you sell slaves???

A) Yeah.

Q) …

A) …

Q) Do you want to explain that a little further, please?

A) Okay, so…maybe “slaves” wasn’t the best choice in terminology. Think of it more as “voluntary indentured servitude” or, more accurately, paying for a service. There are a lot of members in Ska’vyn who have specific talents or skills that other players may really be in need of, so we sometimes let those players sell their time in exchange for gold (and the Guild takes a percentage of the sale).

For instance, we have a few members who are capable of consistently farming 100,000g or more per hour. Maybe they offer to sell three hours of farming time – and you might be able to buy it for only 150,000g. The farmer gets a cut, the guild gets paid, and the buyer is probably going to make a pretty fat profit on the entire transaction. And it’s not just for farming materials – maybe you need some help with farming a specific dungeon for some gear, or desperately want to get one of those fancy skins bound to “Hard Mode” Dungeon & Trial achievements – maybe you just want someone to carry you through a particular zone or delve to grind some experience – whatever it is, Ska’vyn simply acts as the marketplace in which the transaction can be made.

Q) Wait, so you’re not actually selling slaves?

A) Nah, that’s just what we call it. 🙂

Q) Hmm…okay then. So, what if I want to sell something in the Auction? How does that work?

A) If you’d like to sell something at Auction, contact the Guild Master with the specific details of what you’re looking to sell. Keep in mind that Ska’vyn will always take at least 25% of the final sale price as a commission, but if you have something that the Leadership thinks will sell well, we can certainly work something out!

Q) When I sell something at Auction, do I get anything special for it?

A) Well, you obviously get your cut of the gold from the sale, if you elected to take a percentage of the final transaction price. But yes, you do! We always give auction sellers a credit to their xCoin Balance based on the value of the listing they sold, minus any percentage cut that they take from the sale. For more details, you can read about our xCoin Balance system above, in Section III.

Q) What about as a buyer? What’s in it for me if I buy something?

A) Again, the answer is xCoin! If you pay above whatever the posted value of a listing is, we’ll credit your xCoin Balance with the spread above the market value. For instance, if you buy a listing with a market value of 50,000g, but you pay 60,000g, your xCoin Balance would increase by 10,000.

Section VIII

Farmageddon

Q) What is “Farmageddon”?

A) “Farmageddon” is our single most effective fundraising event in Ska’vyn. It’s essentially a race – at the start of the event, everyone who chooses to attend gathers together in Discord, and we all go out into the vast wilds of Tamriel to farm up as many valuable raw materials as possible.

All participants have exactly one hour to farm, and then at the end, we send all of the materials via Mail to the Farmageddon Leader, who then parses out the values of every item using Master Merchant sales data, and assigns a total value (or score) for each participant. After all is said and done, all farmers are paid 50% of the MM value of their haul in gold.

Q) I’m new to farming, or I’m not very efficient at it. What’s in it for me, besides the gold?

A) A few things, actually!

First of all, every item you contribute to the Guild as a result of Farmageddon is counted towards your xCoin Balance. We’re not kidding when we say that the single easiest way to increase your xCoin Balance is to come to Farmageddon – it’s not uncommon for players to raise anywhere from 10,000g – 150,000g+ in a single hour.

Since 50% of that Farmageddon Score counts towards your xCoin Balance, if you farm up 75,000g in materials at the event, your xCoin Balance goes up by 37,500. It’s a truly awesome way to make your requirements while contributing to the guild in a truly meaningful way, and help relieve some of the burden and stress from the biggest donors and leadership.

Also, while the purpose of our Farmageddon events is clearly to raise funds for our Guild Trader and help stock up our Raffles and Auctions with the best prizes, it also offers members a great opportunity to come together, have a fun time, and learn different tips and tricks from one another.

Full transparency here: our main goal with Farmageddon has never been just to raise funds for the guild – it’s to teach our members how to make more gold! We have a lot of experienced players who come to these events every single week, some of whom regularly generate more than 100,000g per hour – and at the end of the day, it benefits us, as the Guild, to help you figure out how to improve your sales and grow your wealth. Maybe you’re only farming for the guild for one hour a week – but the hope is that once you’ve learned to go from farming 25,000g/hour to 75,000g/hour, you’ll be selling a lot more for your own benefit through the Guild Store, which obviously directly benefits you, but also improves the reputation of Ska’vyn as the premier destination for buying and selling goods. Everybody wins!

Q) Okay, I’m in! But how do you keep track of the value of items that people farm?

A) Fantastic question! The answer is pretty simple – we use third-party addons. As far as tracking the values goes, we run a program that parses every item a person sends in, assigns it a value based on the Guild’s Master Merchant data, and then spits out a single, final value. That’s your score. It’s a fully automated process – so there’s no need to worry about human error or favoritism. The value of what you send in is what determines your score.

Q) Noted. So, how often does Ska’vyn host one of these events?

A) Farmageddons generally happen about three times per week, depending on officer availability. The schedule of when the next Farmageddon will occur can be found in the Message of the Day in-game.

Q) What if I can’t make it to Farmageddon? Can I still participate?

A) Yes! You can always send your farming hauls via Mail to the Guild Master, and he’ll credit your xCoin Balance. If you want to donate the items outright, that’ll be the end of that – but if you’d like to get a cut as our members do during the events, that’s also possible. Just indicate your preference in the Mail when you send your items through.